


Of Roads Less Traveled By

by pocketluck



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: All the Durins basically are in love with Bilbo, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF!Bilbo, Battle of Azanulbizar, Bilbo is very emotional, Braids, F/M, Fili kinda has big thing for Bilbo, Frerin got there first, Frerin is still dead, Gen, Long Lived Hobbits, M/M, The AU where Frerin did some traveling, Timeline What Timeline, beads, blonde frerin, fili looks like frerin, imagine how you would feel if you found out the love of your life was once married to your uncle, not fun, really - Freeform, the au where bilbo was married to frerin, thorin donest know how to deal with emotions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-09
Updated: 2014-03-09
Packaged: 2018-01-15 02:05:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1287175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pocketluck/pseuds/pocketluck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Fili asks if Bilbo had a spouse waiting for him back in The Shire, it ends with unforeseen complications.</p><p>Or: That AU in which Bilbo is actually Fili and Kili's uncle by marriage and no one knew a thing about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Roads Less Traveled By

**Author's Note:**

> I just wanted a fic where Bilbo had married a dwarf before he met The Company and something terrible happened to him. Totally not inspired by A Shot In The Dark at all. Really.
> 
> It's my headcannon that Frerin is blonde like Fili.

"Obbit lass back home, lad?" The Company had stopped their perilous walking for the day, everyone drawn up close and tight around the camp fire as the winds grew bolder. They were all chatting comfortably, not really having much to say but wanting to fill the silence up with something other than the groans of the trees.

At first, Bilbo didn't even realize the question was meant for him, too busy trying to bury himself into his thin blanket from his traveling pack. He jerked his head up from within the blanket's confines, looking at the expectant face of Fili.

Bilbo usually didn't get involved in all of the conversations, too tired to do much else but not fall over himself. But it seemed Fili had questions tonight, and it was one Bilbo could do without. When Bilbo didn't answer, shock and Aule forbid, _fear_ rearing it's ugly head within his chest, the dwarves near by slowed down their own private chatting, looking over to the two of them, waiting for what caused Bilbo to go so still.

Bilbo's body was tense, drawn tight like a bowstring, the knuckles that clutched the frayed ends of his blanket turning white. He subconsciously wanted to reach for the bead hanging around his neck, hidden under his shirt and vest, pressed tightly against his skin and suddenly weighing a thousand times heavier.

By this time, all of the dwarves were staring at him, something between confusion and concern in all of their faces, and while Bilbo may have been flattered earlier at the response, now he just wished to put on his blasted ring and disappear from their gazes. Fili had the decency to look a little abashed, his hands clasped in his lap across the log from Bilbo, brows drawn down.

"You don't have to answer— I mean we were just curious is all—" Kili started, saving his brother from further embarrassment, but Bilbo raised a hand to cease his efforts.

"No, no, it's quite alright. I was just surprised is all," Bilbo's heart beat loudly in his chest, his own voice sounding far too hoarse for his liking, "I don't, to answer your question. I...It's a hard thing to talk about, Fili."

There it was. It was out. There was no going back on this now, and Bilbo wished for all his might that maybe they wouldn't ask more questions, save him the trouble of having to explain his sorrows to his new companions.

He hasn't spoken of... _him_ in many years, and he really didn't want to start now. It would appear that the hobbit would have no such luck. Gloin tilted his head from across the fire, his hair looked practically like it was burning, face lit all up like a forge.

"We understand if you don't want to tell us anything. I was talking about me wife and we all saw how big your house was. We just got to wondering why it wasn't full of children, at this point." Gloin said so in a sincere voice, his eyes dancing up at the mention of his family.

Bilbo gripped his blankets harder. He could do this. Maybe they would understand, them being dwarves themselves, of the amount of will power it was taking not to bust down in tears in front of these warriors.

If it was possible, the Company saw Bilbo grow tenser, his back ram-rod straight, the entire position something an elven solider would have been proud of. Bilbo let out a long breath, his hands shaking as he brought his lowered gaze back up to his friends, all of them waiting for how this would play out.

"It's fine. Really," Bilbo let out a humorless chuckle, "if anyone, you should all know. I- um. I was bonded once," there was a collective tensing of the dwarves around him, Bilbo drew in another breath, bracing, "he..he was a dwarf from Erebor, actually."

Bilbo swallowed visibly, his friends drawing in shuttering gasps around him. Not a single one spoke up. Fili looked like he had been stabbed, and Gloin's face palled. Bilbo cleared his throat, willing his hands to stop shaking as he brushed some hair out of his face.

"H-How did you meet him? What was he like?" Ori's small voice made Bilbo's eyes snap up, focusing in on the small dwarf with an ink bottle in his hands. Bilbo should have known that Ori would have liked to write this down, and he mentally cursed himself before smiling sadly. He scuffed his feet against the dirt, swallowed again.

"I met him two years before my coming of age. He strolled into the Shire one day, smiling and running from Farmer Maggot. Apparently he had stolen some carrots of his garden, and he needed someplace to hide before the old coot caught up with him, " Bilbo remembered that quite vividly.

"So I let him into my house. Gandalf told you once that was a little adventurous, and I had lots of questions to ask him. I had never seen a dwarf before, so I helped him wait out the search." Bilbo drew his hands together, rubbing calming circles into his knuckles, staring quietly into the fire. His whole body twitched, slowly uping his eyes to look embarrassingly at Fili.

"He looked a lot like you. Almost too much. That..that was kinda why I tried slamming the door in your face." Bilbo smiled up at him, remembering his own shock at seeing Fili on his door-step, dressed up in furs and having _his_ Aule forsaken eyes and _his_ smile and _his_ face.

Fili's expression changed from sorrow to interest, the dwarf stopped wringing his hands. Kili pressed a little closer to his brother, discomfort clear on everyone's faces. There was a pause, silence filled with nothing but the cracks of the fire, and Bilbo decided that it was now or never. It was out, and his friend's faces were practically begging him to continue, so he did.

"He was blonde too-hair all a mess constantly. He got me into a bunch of trouble, and every time I tried to get him to leave for an inn he'd just show back up at my house in the dead of night, asking to let him in. Can you imagine the nerve?" Bilbo smiled again, this one with a hint of teeth and genuine humor. Fili didn't even look at him, eyes focused on the dirt as if it was the most interesting puzzle he had ever seen.

Kili coughed lowly, his fingers twitching against their place at the dwarf's knees. Ori wrote all this down, his quill scarping sharply over the parchment as he tried to write as quickly as possible. Surprisingly, it was Thorin who broke the silence, his face a mix between confusion and - sweet Yavanna - was that pain?

"How did you know he was from Erebor?" His voice rumbled lowly, barely more than a whisper. It still sounded like his words caused everything to shut off, not another soul dared ask another question, their bodies tense and their faces a mesh of jumbled emotions.

Bilbo didn't even try to sort them out, his own mind fumbling slightly with the memory overload, memories he had not dealt on in several years. He should have known this was going to be more painful than he wanted.

"He told me, one day. I asked him where he was from, trying to see if maybe I could meet his family. It's...it's customary to ask a parent's permission for their child's hand. And I wanted to get a blessing, if nothing at least. He told me it wouldn't be necessary. He said he lost his mother from the fires, and his father was far too busy to come to The Shire." His voice trembled, remembering the sorrow he felt for the dwarf he loved, how terrible it must have felt to lose his mother to such an end, how much it must have weighed on his heart.

Bilbo looked at Thorin now, locking eyes with him briefly, and between them was a shared pain that Bilbo did not expect. Thorin stilled, the dwarf's shoulder seemed to shake for a moment, almost so quickly that Bilbo didn't notice at all.

He didn't have any time to contemplate the reaction, a large hand came and rested on his shoulder, and Bilbo nearly jolted at the contact. Bofur smiled grimly down at him, his fingers a warm pressure against Bilbo's shirt.

"What happened to him?" Ah. _Ah._ There was the prize question, the golden ticket. Bilbo shut his eyes, willing the memories away, the happiness he felt with _him,_ the pain when he left, the bone-seeping agony when he never returned, all of it. He wanted it gone. He wouldn't be a victim to his own life, he would not allow this to ruin him. _He_ wouldn't have wanted it to.

And wasn't that just a kicker, that Bilbo was forced to wait alone, hoping everyday that he would see a wild mess of blonde braids coming his way, only to wait years, _years,_ and suddenly there was this new _him_ on his door mat after so long of waiting.

And then it turned out to not be the dwarf Bilbo had so wished, but it was still a dwarf, and then he was thrown back into another adventure, and he still wasn't sure if this was all worth it. Bilbo reached for the bead around his neck, his fingers curling on the item almost viciously. Bofur dropped his hand, his jaw tensing, but his eyes were full of empathy.

"The twat got himself _killed,_ "His voice broke, "left one day sprouting nonsense about duty and responsibilities and _Moria_ and he was off before I could even stop him." Bilbo lowered his head into one of his hands, pinching the bridge of his nose as tears began to build in his eyes. Fili gripped his brothers hand, practically snapping it in half, and Thorin was nearly radiating fury, something in his demeanor that spoke of pain and murder. Balin closed his eyes, understand dawning on his face. Ori stopped writing.

"I think the worst part was that I didn't even know. _Aule, I didn't even know._ I waited for him to come home, waiting for news that he had won, anything," Bilbo let Bofur grab his hand away from his face, his finger twisting with Bilbo's.

"And he never did. And one day this new dwarf shows up at my house, with _his goddamn sword in his hands_ and all he could say was sorry." Bilbo let out a wounded chuckle, surprisingly dark even to his own ears, "sorry but he had died in The First Assault of The Vanguard, whatever the even meant, and that he said he wanted me to have _this._ " Bilbo pulled his hand away, a couple tears slipped past his eyelashes, slowly moving down his cheekbones.

Fili looked wrecked, his head in his hands as he listened on. Thorin felt like a force of nature, as if the very air around him was charged with horror and rage. No one said a word. Bilbo wiped the tears off his face, gripping his arms. He liked to think it was from the cold.

His heart shriveled in his chest, beating painfully. Every pulse was a reminder. A reminder that he lived on while _he_ did not. His breathing a turned erratic, eyes stinging, hands twitched to rip his necklace of and throw it into the fire.

" _Mahal_ , Bilbo— I'm so sorry." Bofur said, his arms coming around Bilbo, clutching at him, and Bilbo didn't know it was for his comfort of Bofur's own. He wrapped an arm around Bofur, his other hand gripping his necklace.

"We hadn't even been married two years by then. And he didn't have much. We didn't even have time to make _real_ memories. We didn't have enough time." Bilbo trailed off, his voice growing more steady, but his fingers turning white. Bofur hugged him all the harder.

Fili suddenly stood, walking over in a few short strides, and fell to his knees. He gripped at Bilbo's arms, finger digging in almost painfully, but Bilbo hardly even registered it.

He let out a string of brutal grunts, and it took a moment for Bilbo to realize that Fili was speaking in  _Khuzdul._ Fili's voice shook, the syllables seemed to fall over on themselves. He repeated whatever he said over and over, a mindless mantra against Bilbo's legs. Thorin's jaw tensed, and he drew himself up to his full height, look at Bilbo with fire in his eyes.

"What was his name? We can honor him, if nothing else, when we reach the mountain. We can give him the respect he deserves." Thorin walked over slowly, as if approaching a wounded animal, his hands clasped behind his back. He was not touching Bilbo, but it was clear that he wanted to. Bilbo nodded, a lump forming in his throat. He ran a hand through Fili's hair, soothing the sounds coming from the young dwarf.

"His name was Frerin." In all of Bilbo's years, in all of his time spent with snarling Lobelia, in all of time beating riddles from Gandalf, in all of his time, never had he seen such a reaction from anyone. It was as if as soon as the words left his mouth that Thorin had backed away as if he had been burned, as if Smaug himself had broken out of the ground below him.

Thorin's face twisted into something unrecognizable, pain, horror, fear, confusion, shock, disbelief, _pain,_ flashed all together in a desperate fight to make each other known. Fili stopped mumbling, his entire body freezing, shoulders locked as if he was about to publicly flogged. Bofur whipped away, gazing up at Bilbo as if asking him to take back what he had said, mouth open as if to ask a wordless question.

Even _Dwalin_ looked shocked, and Bilbo was sure the only emotions the dwarf had was irritation and rage. Bilbo looked up at Thorin, hands pulling at Fili's hair in an attempt to anchor himself.

"What did you just say?" Thorin seemed to find his voice, and it filled deep into Bilbo's veins. Confusion colored Bilbo's face, eyes creased in concern for his friend.

"Frerin. His name was Frerin." He said again, and the moment it fell from his lips Fili lurched away, braids swinging with the force of it, stumbling backwards to fall only inches from the fire.

"You cant mean that. That can't possibly be right," Fili's had an almost desperate hitch in his voice, "tell me your lying. Tell me that's not true." Bilbo scowled, standing in one quick motion, his blanket falling off his form.

"Why would I lie? Do you think this is a game to me? That talking about his death is something I do every week when it meets my fancy!?" Bilbo asked, his voice a near hiss, looking to someone for help, anyone, but all of the dwarves were rooted where they stood. Fili looked to Thorin, his eyes a shattered wreck.

"Surely there must be other Frerins. Was it not a common name?!" He pulled himself away from the fire, and Kili fell in front of him. His hair fell around him like a curtain, shoulders quaking.

"We should have known. We should have known as soon as he said Vanguard." Kili spoke in a broken whisper, hands gripped his trousers. Fili seemed all the more enraged at his brother's words. Thorin reached for Bilbo now, his large hands grabbing both of Bilbo's shoulders. They locked gazes, steel meeting emerald, and in that moment Thorin knew. Knew that there was no way Bilbo was lying about this, knew that there was no ambiguity left.

This was real, and the sudden weight of it made his shoulder slump, practically curling in on himself. Bilbo reached inside his shirt, he grasped the chain in his palm, and ripped it off his neck. He threw it at Fili's hands.

"He braided that into my hair at our marriage ceremony. I..I couldn't stand to see it every morning when I knew he was never going to redo it, so I took it out and made a necklace. I take it everywhere I go." Bilbo watched Fili grab the chain, his fingers brushing over every crevice of the bead, seeing the etchings in the metal.

It was beautiful craftsmanship, and Bilbo remembered when Frerin had given it to him, deftly placing it into his hair, pressing a kiss to the bead, smiling down at Bilbo as if he was the most glorious being in all of Middle Earth, and the pain in Bilbo's chest returned. Fili just let out a choked gasp of air, but not a single tear fell. Kili pulled Fili into his arms, burying his head into the crook of his brother's neck.

"It the symbol of our line. Kili— _it's our symbol._ " Fili whispered brokenly against his brother's skin. Kili gripped him harder. Thorin stumbled, falling back onto his original log, his head falling into his hands, obscuring the sight of his broken eyes.

Bilbo drifted back, letting Bofur catch him before he hit the ground. Realization spiked him like a sword to the gut, all of the air rushed from his lungs. He laughed quietly, his whole body shaking from the force of it.

"I should have known. I should have known the second Fili showed up at my door. The similarities were too many to ignore anyway." He said between bouts of laughter, boarding on the hysteric. Here was Frerin's family. Like he always dreamed about meeting, always wondered if they would like him, how they would feel about a hobbit marrying a dwarf, how they would feel about accepting him into the ranks, and they've been in front of him for months.

He groaned, a mix between a sob and a gulp of air. Bofur drew his hands up around Bilbo's arms, trying to calm him, a silent offer of support. Fili pulled away from his brother, his sadness swept away with something akin to a silent fury.

"He never told you? He never said a word about Thorin? Or Dis?" Fili's hands were balled, his fingernails dipped into his skin. Bilbo tensed his jaw, watching the way Fili crushed the necklace in his palm.

"Not once. I always just assumed he was an only child. Talking about his family was a sore subject, so I tried my best not to ask." It was the truth afterall. After hearing that Frerin had lost his mother, Bilbo did his best not to question him on anything family related.

The last thing he wanted to do was bring up bad memories, to make Frerin uncomfortable, to even see him hurt would have ruined Bilbo. So he rarely said a word. And it wasn't as if Frerin ever wanted to talk about where he came from anyway.

Bilbo had made peace with his death, despite it all. It was hard to admit that, harder still that he should even have to admit that, but he would not deny the truth. His time spent with Frerin was like a dream, his memories practically clouded over, words they had exchanged lost with time. T

hey had such little time together, almost none actually, and a natural Hobbit courtship should have taken at least three years, but there was something about Frerin that made him want to rush it. Whether that was love or foreboding Bilbo could no longer tell.

Ironically, Bilbo was the most put together of all of them. Even though he was the one who lost a husband, Bilbo watched as the dwarves slowly came back to themselves, the charge in the air lessening if only slightly.

"Like I said, we were't together long," Bilbo began again, his voice not even hitching at this point, "and even then our time together was limited. He was always running off somewhere, and...now I guess that was back to you, Thorin." The sound of the dwarf's name made his head shoot up, his lips set together in a thin line.

"He would leave constantly, now that I remember." Thorin murmured, his deep voice cutting into the open air like a drum, "I always thought he was gone to find work. It appears we were both very wrong about where he journeyed." Fili winced, his hands still grasping at the necklace. Bilbo wanted something, anything to change the energy of the conversation.

He has had enough with death and judgement, of feeling that dull ache in his chest whenever he thought of Frerin, of seeing his friends in pain. So he smiled. Small, barely there, just a slight upturn of his lips, and patted Bofur on the shoulder. He looked to Thorin now, eyes dancing with small bits of mirth, trying to remember the good times before the bad.

"Was he always so annoying with you too?" Bilbo asked almost joyfully, tapping his foot. Dwalin bit off a cough, but for him Bilbo assumed it was something akin to a snort. It made him smile all the wider. Thorin looked dazed for a moment, unable to form words.

Fili still looked angry, his lips pulled back in a tense scowl, and Bilbo desperately wanted to see him smiling again. Thorin seemed to regain himself, and his lips uplifted just so.

"Yes, yes he was." The King flicked his gaze up at Bilbo, his eyes warming ever so slightly.

"Don't underplay it now. That dwarf was a menace to everything he touched. Broke countless vases, trampled all over our garden, pulled pranks on our neighbors. Did he ever tell you about the time he set my kitchen on fire?" Bilbo asked lightly, almost nonchalant.

He wanted to foucs on the _good._ The way Frerin could make his mornings worth it, the sun displayed over his skin like he was daisy, blessed with rich tones. The Frerin always knew what to say, the silver-tongued dwarf that he was, the way Frerin had a heart of gold to match his wild hair, untameable and shining. The information drew a smile chuckle out of Dwalin, and a larger smile out of Thorin.

"Did he ever tell you of the time when we were boys, that he would skip his reading lessons to sneak pies out from the kitchens?" Thorin asked now, his eyes taking the look of a place far far away. Bilbo shook his head, already seeing it now. He missed the way Fili tensed further.

"I made him a flower crown once. I wish you could have seen the look on his face, Thorin. He looked absolutely horrified." Bilbo chuckled now, his voice full of life and his smile real. This was what kept he through, these memories, these feelings. He would not linger on how they had ended, but what they had become.

Fili made a small noise, deep in the back of his throat, and suddenly he was off, stomping through the trees with his brother close on his tail. Bilbo's smile fell, and he made a move to follow him before Bofur laid a hand on his shoulder.

"Let em' go, lad. He needs some time to himself." Bofur pressed his hand further, all but pushing Bilbo into his seat. It was immediately sobering, and the wind came back into Bilbo's mind, realizing his fingers had grown numb. Bilbo nodded, stealing one last glance at the way the brothers had fled into the woods.

Fili's intense reaction had been odd, alarming, strange in every possible way. Bilbo couldn't find a reason for it in his mind, not a single thing clicking into place. Fili was usually so bright, so intense in his cheerfulness, that seeing him in anyway sad made Bilbo almost despair as well. But that was the nature of friends, and Bilbo hoped with all his heart that someday Fili would tell him what he had done to upset him so much.

Thorin and Bilbo locked eyes once more, both of them lost all of the mirth that once was building, and sighed almost in perfect tandem. Bilbo looked mournfully into the fire, imaging how much of an image Frerin would have been if he was here, the flames dancing against his hair, light shining in his eyes with that lascivious smile that hung across his face as a constant in Bilbo's direction.

The hobbit grabbed his blanket again, pulling it tightly back against his body, emotionally and physically spent. He imagined Frerin laughing with flowers in his hair, cheekbones supporting a deep blush, hands reaching out to brush against Bilbo's collarbone, his fingers spreading jolts of warmth across Bilbo's frame, and he smiled, if only for the memory, if only for the one chance he had with him. It was not enough. It would never be enough. But for now, it would have to do.


End file.
